Infinity of Love
by ElphieRiaAddams
Summary: When Mike Franks died, he left Gibbs a devastating clue; "she... is... alive...". As Gibbs tries to discover what his mentor meant, events come crashing down around him and he soon finds out exactly who Mike meant. Trouble is, she is in deadly trouble. Possible spoilers up to 8x23 Swan Song.
1. Prologue

As Gibbs ran out into the street, ignoring the pounding rain and flashed of lightning, he could see Mike lying in the middle of the road, alone. It was only as he reached his old friend's side that he could see the scalpel in his chest. Thinking the man was already gone, Gibbs cradled Mike's head in his lap forlornly, cursing whoever was intent on killing off his entire family network.

It was only when Mike gasped softly that Gibbs realised his mentor was still alive. Reaching for his radio, Gibbs began to press the call button when Mike spoke in a harsh whisper.

"No point... Probie... I'm a goner."

"No, Mike, We'll get help, you'll recover from this, you're harder to kill than this."

"No... Probie..." Mike's hand shakily reached up to Jethro's face, grabbing his attention as he was quickly fading.

"You need... to know..."

"Know what?"

"Quit... interrupting... you need... to... know..."

Mike took a shaky breath and, for a moment, Jethro worried that he would not hear the secret that was clearly important for it to likely be Mike's last words.

"She is... alive."

"Who is? Damnit Mike, stop being so fucking cryptic!"

"She... isn't dead... she is... alive."

With those final words, and his eternal smirk on his lips, Mike's hand fell limply at his side as he finally slipped away, leaving Jethro alone in the pouring rain, holding the body of his oldest friend and trying to figure out what the final words of his mentor meant.


	2. Chapter 1

**I'm just going to apologise now, this is another short chapter, but the next few are considerably longer and also get into the actual meat of the story, but the first two are needed to set the story. Enjoy :)**

Several weeks later, Jethro was sat at his desk, attempting to clear his inbox of the large number of unopened emails. Sighing heavily, Jethro looked up and his gaze fell across the photographs on his desk. Abby had updated the collage frame to include Mike in recent weeks, and so the images now showed Mike, Kelly, Shannon and Jenny.

It was on Jenny's face that Jethro's eyes lingered, as it had many times in the past few years. Although not prone to what ifs, Jethro couldn't help but wonder if she would still have been around if he'd gone with her on her final trip rather than Ziva and Tony. He wondered what may have happened if he hadn't accepted her insistence that there would be no 'off the job'. He wondered what could have happened if she hadn't left him the 'Dear John' letter as she left him behind after Paris.

But now, at this particular moment, he wondered if she was really as dead as he had always believed. He didn't want to get his hopes up, but after going through the list of women that he had told Mike Franks about in the past who were dead, he came up with a list of 5.

Diane and Kate he knew were gone; he had been there as both had been shot by a sniper through the forehead. Which left Shannon, Kelly and Jenny. But, as much as he wished with all of his heart for his daughter to still be alive, he had also seen her body in the morgue, lying peacefully alongside her mother.

Which left him with Jenny.

And, now that he thought about it, the scenario seemed more plausible by the day. he had never seen her body, only a black body bag. Ducky had not performed the autopsy, being too personally attached to Jenny to contemplate performing the procedures. How was Jethro to know that it was really Jenny in that bag? He hadn't even seen her at the crime scene, none of them had, except for Leon. So no-one could truly set his mind to rest that she was gone, unless they were to exhume her body and that was one possibility that Gibbs was not even willing to contemplate. Instead, the thoughts continued to run in cycles around his head, appearing most often as he worked in the basement on his boat.

Shaking his head, Gibbs tried to finally return his attention to his emails. He only managed another four messages before a ping rung out from his computer.

"McGee, what was that? I didn't do anything."

McGee came around the desk behind Gibbs, standing over his shoulder as he explained

"It's OK boss, that wasn't you, that was a message coming in to the inbox. See, the one in bold at the top... hang on... boss, this one says it's important, open it first before you go clearing it out."

Gibbs rolled his eyes before clicking on the message. However, his hand froze as the message loaded.

"Holy shit... is that? How?"

"McGee, what you wittering on about now?" asked Tony, "Who is it? One of the exes?"

"Tony, shut up." The ice in McGee's voice grabbed both Tony and Ziva's attention and they quickly came behind the screen.

"Is that...?" Tony and Ziva shared a look of horror and confusion.

"Jenny."


	3. Chapter 2

**OK, wow. Thank you so much to everyone who has read, favourited, followed or reviewed this story so far, I'm glad you seem to all be interested in what's to come here…**

Team Gibbs stared at their boss in amazement at his statement. However, there was no lie in what he said.

All four of them could see Jennifer Shepard in a video thumbnail.

"How can it be her?" asked Ziva, "Is this some ill joke?"

"Sick," corrected Tony automatically, "and yes, it's definitely a sick joke."

"I don't think it's a joke guys," added McGee, "she looks older in this image than I remember her looking here. And the video has a timestamp from half an hour ago."

"It's a video?" asked Gibbs, finally speaking but not taking his eyes off the image on his screen.

"Yeah, see the little triangle, that means-"

Tony quickly cut in, knowing that Gibbs had no patience for technology.

"It means that Gibbs wants you to play it Probie. Now."

"Oh... right, sure, now. On the screen?"

"I don't think this is something that needs to be shared around the agency yet," shot back Ziva sharply, suddenly scared about what was happening to her long thought dead friend.

McGee shook his head at his own stupidity as he clicked play.

The video grew to fill the entirety of Gibbs' computer screen and the team watched as the video began, the camera turning on to show Jenny in a chair, her arms clearly secured behind her back, although it was unlikely she would have been going anywhere even if she hadn't been secured.

It seemed that there was not a single inch of Jenny's body that was not bruised or bloodied.

Her once cream vest top was crusted with dried blood and had several rips across her body.

Although they could not see below her knees, the tan skin on show under her shorts was covered in bruising and blood smears.

Her hair, a lighter golden red than it had been previously, lay tangled limply around her shoulders.

But Gibbs was most upset and angered when he saw her face.

When he saw the image on the message she had a half smile playing around her lips but looked perfectly healthy.  
It was clear to Gibbs that whoever was holding her had avoided marring her face, which in itself scared him with the connotations. A gag pulled tight between her teeth was the only difference between the two images now.

The entire image would have been gruesome enough it if wasn't their former boss and friend. But looking at Jenny, looking quite so vulnerable caused all of them to feel sickened in a way they had not in a long time.

All of this flew through their heads in the few seconds that it took them all to evaluate the situation as they had been trained.

There was around ten seconds of footage of only Jenny before a man walked into the frame, his face masked.

Walking right to Jenny's side, the man grasped a handful of her hair, pulling her head back sharply, straining her neck.

Jenny's pained whimper, audible even through her gag, made Gibbs grasp at the edge of his desk, trying to control his emotions to watch the video.

"Hello there Gibbs, I'm gonna call you Gibbs cause that's so much better than Leroy, and I feel that Jenny here is one of the few people that gets away with calling you Jethro. Yes, we know all about you both. Not that we did before. You see, I didn't know that Jenny here was indeed Jenny. As far as I'm aware, this is Kat Joshua, resident of Miami Beach. She unfortunately decided to act like Superwoman and save this cute little thing in an alley behind a bar last Saturday Night."

Gibbs automatically worked out that she had been held by these guys for four days. That meant that Jenny had been in danger for 96 hours and he hadn't known.

"See the cute little thing was our next girl; we'd been watching her for a couple of weeks. But, whilst she got away, we followed this one instead and decided we'd keep her. I mean, she's feisty, and hot for an older one, wouldn't you say Gibbs?"

The man ran his hand down Jenny's cheek but when she tried to flinch away from his touch, he slapped her hard, causing her to grunt in pain and causing Gibbs' heart to contract painfully.

"Well we brought her back to our place and ran her prints. Imagine our surprise when she turns up as the deceased Director of NCIS. Lame federal agency to be in charge of but still, she looked good for a dead woman walking. So, we did some more digging, and we found out that she seemed to be in a lot of photographs with a certain Agent Gibbs. Which is how you came to receive this message."

Gibbs watched Jenny's face whilst her captor continued to elucidate his plans.

"See, you have a choice here. I know that you don't know that she's alive, I saw the images from the funeral. Very touching. So you could just ignore this video and leave pretty Jenny here with us."

The man's hand moved from her cheek to her breast and the man cruelly squeezed at her flesh, causing her to groan in pain once again.

"Alternatively, you can pay a ransom. Now, we aren't sure about the going rate for former Directors of federal agencies but I'm pretty sure she's worth a pretty penny. So let's start at half a million. If you pay that in the next... 12 hours, then you'll get her back. But it'll rise to 750,000 for 24 hours and a cool million for 48 hours. If you don't give us the money in that time, we'll assume you don't want her and she'll join the family business. So your choice Agent Gibbs... get thinking fast."

The video cut almost immediately after he finished talking, and McGee absently noted out loud that there must have been at least two assailants.

"Ya think McGeek? Why else would he be saying 'we' all the goddamned time?"

"Could've been a red herring, trying to make us think he's part of some organisation instead of some crazy, lone wolf."

"Hmmm.…got a point there McGee. So, we now know that there are at least two kidnappers. What we now need to do i- Boss?"

Tony's sentence stopped abruptly as Gibbs stood, almost violently pushing his seat away, and headed up the stairs towards the Directors office.

"Oh shit, I would not want to be the Director right now," said Tony as they watched Gibbs storm into the office, throwing the door shut behind him.

"You think he knew?" asked Tim.

"Of course he did Tim," said Ziva, sliding into Gibbs' seat and beginning to attempt to trace the email, "he wouldn't let us see Jenny's body in the diner when we arrived, he was the only one who could have possibly known that she was still alive. And someone had to help her settle into WitSec."

The team fell into silence, the new information sinking in as they realised that they had been lied to for years.

"Hi guys!" Just then, the doors to the lift opened and Abby stepped out, walking into the bullpen.

"What's up? McGee, hello? Is it another body?"

"No. Abby, I think you should sit down."

Tim pulled his chair out from behind his desk and guided Abby to sit in it, the latter of whom was looking increasingly bemused by the morose looks on her friends faces. Tony stepped in front of Abby and began to speak softly.

"Abby, we need to tell you something, something important."

"OK, shoot Tony, I'm ready."

"Jenny's alive."

"Jenny? Who?"

"Jenny... Director Jennifer Shepard..."

"No, that's not possible, she died three years ago, she was shot. Are you guys sure you're OK? I think this group hallucination could be caused by gas exposure, or eating certain types of mushroom or-"

Abby tailed off as Ziva opened a still image on the large screen in the bull pen.

"Oh my god, Jenny... look at her, she's hurt." Abby jumped up and ran to take a closer look at the image of the redhead whilst Ziva continued the explanation.

"And a lot more," added Ziva, "these men have been holding her for four days now, and only just have decided to send Gibbs an ultimatum. They did not originally know what jackpot they had stumbled upon when they kidnapped Jenny, also known as Kat..."

"Joshua," supplied Tony when Ziva looked for help remembering, "she's been living in Witness Services since the shooting as far as we're aware."

"You OK Abs?" asked Tim as she remained silent.

Seeing their goth shake her head as she tried her best to hold back her tears, Tim quickly moved to her side and held her close, letting her know he was there for her.

"Where's Gibbs?" Abby suddenly realised that their boss was not there and she knew that he would be deeply affected, not only by the news that she was alive, but also by the fact of her being in imminent and very real danger.

"He stormed up into Vance's office. He clicked real quick that the Director had to have known that Jenny was still alive and kicking somewhere in the world."

"Oh I wouldn't want to be him right now," said Abby, echoing Tony's sentiment from moments earlier, and this time no-one could disagree.

"Gibbs, what can I do for you today?" asked Leon wearily as his door flew open, the seemingly irate Special Agent blowing into his office.

"Jenny Shepard. She's alive and you didn't tell me. Why? What the hell happened that you didn't think you could trust me to keep that secret?"

"Jenny Shepard died in the diner three years ago Gibbs, I don't know what you're talking about."

"OK, sorry, Kat Joshua is alive, barely, somewhere near Miami. Better?"

At hearing Jenny's alias, Leon's eyes grew wide, knowing that Jethro did indeed know the truth.

"How did you find out?" he asked sharply.

"I was just sent a lovely hostage video of Jenny - sorry, Kat - having been beaten and god knows what else for the past four days. She's holding on but these guys mean business. They want 500,000 in the next twelve hours, or the money increases for the next 48 hours until they will then sell her into what I'm pretty sure is human trafficking and prostitution. And I ain't letting that happen Leon, I swear to God!"

Gibbs' voice rose steadily in volume until he was shouting at Leon who had the common sense to not even attempt to explain his reasoning to Gibbs. He was, however, highly concerned by the news that Gibbs had just imparted.

"Someone kidnapped Jenny?"

"Yep, four days ago. And she looks like hell. Not that you care. She's been missing for four days and that didn't throw up any red flags in WitSec?"

"We had minimal contact with Jenny to keep her safe."

"La Grenouille is dead, so is everyone else that was involved with him, or they're in prison. And Svetlana and everyone involved in the shootout at the diner is also taken care of. What more reason is there to keep her in WitSec? You get to keep your cushy job?"

"Not at all Jethro, I can't believe you think so little of me. But there have been other threats that were made on her life that she couldn't deal with. So she needed to disappear. The FBI have been in charge of the investigation into the threats ever since and have almost completely guaranteed Jenny's safety should she return. But she knew she would still be under protection for the next six months at least."

"OK, I can believe there being more enemies. But tell me Leon, why didn't you tell me? Why did I have to find out through a hostage video?"

"I'm sorry Jethro, we just couldn't afford one single leak or slip up."

"Yeah well, thanks to technology that's exactly what has happened, and now I know, and now this scum have sent us a video and an email address to contact about the ransom."

"Jethro, you know that we don't negotiate with terrorists, which these guys clearly are."

"I know, and I don't plan on doing any sort of negotiation. We will just do as they say and give them the money and get Jenny back."

"We can't do that Gibbs, where are you going to get the money?"

"We have plenty stashed in the reserves Leon, and don't tell me otherwise cause unless you've spent a couple of extra billion dollars on suits and cars then that money is still there. Jenny made sure there was a slush fund."

Gibbs' knowledge of the private slush fund that the federal agency directors had access to in emergency situations unnerved Leon as he suddenly realised that there was perhaps something to the rumours that had spread around NCIS about the nature of the relationship between Gibbs and Director Shepard.

"Gibbs, I know that you have some personal feelings for Jennifer-"

"You're damn right I do. I've lost her twice now Leon, I sure as hell ain't making it an unlucky third. So you just do whatever you have to do to get that money. I think you owe it to her."

Leon chose his next words very precisely.

"I'm afraid the rules are very clear Special Agent Gibbs, we do not deal with terrorists. Even when it involves the Former Direcotr of NCIS. I'm sorry."

Gibbs turned sharply to leave the office but Leon called out, stopping him in his tracks.

"Where are you going now Gibbs?" he asked. Gibbs turned back to look at his boss, a steely determination in his eyes.

"I'm going to get Jenny, even if it's the last thing I do as an NCIS agent."


	4. Chapter 3

**So updates are probably going to be once a week on this story, depending on how much I can write during the week. I'm so glad everyone seems to be liking this and reading it, it really does mean a lot to me. Sorry that there isn't much action in this chapter but the next few will more than make up for it (I hope).**

Abby was in her lab several hours later, her music blaring and her fingers flying across the keyboard, trying to analyse the email that Gibbs had received that morning.

She didn't want any interruptions or distractions so had locked the door to her lab whilst she worked.

However, it also meant that she was unaware of Tim's banging on her door.

It was only when she whirled around to grab something from her desk that she saw his shadow and jumped.

"McGee, don't do that!"

Rushing to the door, Abby let Tim in before she quickly locked it again behind him.

"Abby, why'd you lock the door?"

Abby moved past Tim back to her desk and continued typing feverishly as she answered him.

"Well the only people who don't interrupt me with stupid stuff when I'm concentrating are Gibbs and Ziva, and you of course. And I know Gibbs and Ziva are on the plane right now so it only left you and well, I thought you were busy."

"I am, but I need your help. And I think neither of us should be alone right now. I know that there are all these thoughts running through my head. What if they don't get to her in time Abby?"

"No! Don't say that Tim!" Abby turned to Tim and he was a little scared at the intensity in her eyes.

"Gibbs won't ever let something happen to Jenny, she's too important to him. He loves her."

"Loved Abby."

"No Tim, loves. Have you seen how often he looks at the pictures on his desk? Or how he still talks about Jenny in present tense before correcting himself when he does occasionally mention her. He's been hurting so much since she 'died' and now that he has a chance to get her back, he won't stop. I've never seen him so keen to get out of this building. He _loves_ her Timmy. I wish I would meet someone who looked at me like that."

Abby sighed softly before returning her attention to her work, meaning she missed the tender look that Tim gave her before he turned to his own work alongside her.

* * *

"Gibbs, walking around will not get us there faster. Why don't you sit down?" asked Ziva.

Watching her boss striding up and down the cargo bay had her getting antsy herself, and she knew that such an atmosphere would not be conducive to locating Jenny quickly and efficiently.

Turning to Tony beside her, she implored him to say something with a well-placed elbow in his side.

"Ow! OK, Boss, Ziva's right. Why don't you sit, conserve your energy? You're gonna get to kick ass soon enough."  
Gibbs ignored his two agent's comments and continued to walk lengths of the plane.

In truth, he knew that if he sat down he would start to think and his imagination would undoubtedly run wild.

Which he couldn't deal with at that moment.

After rewatching the video, he could see every flinch and wince that Jenny made repeating in his mind.

He could see the pain and fear in her eyes and his brain wondered what had caused her to have such a visible reaction when she had carefully cultivated emotional barriers for years as she rose the ranks in NCIS.

So, instead of focusing on his brain's wild musings, he was instead mapping out his next boat in his head.

But that still left him restless, so he continued in his march.

"D'you think we could sedate him or something?" said Tony quietly to Ziva, both of them still watching for any reaction from Gibbs.

"I doubt it would work. And, I must say, I would also be pacing up and down if there were enough space. I hate sitting still whilst knowing that Jenny is in danger."

Tony realised that Ziva had indeed been unnaturally quiet over the past few hours and he remembered that the Israeli woman had a close friendship with the Director.

"How you holding up anyway?" he asked in a softer tone.

"I am fine. I will be better when we have Jenny back with us and when I have killed those men responsible for the harm that she has befallen. Not that I will not allow her the chance to hurt them first. That would be the honourable thing."

"I don't think she's gonna be in the state to be causing any physical harm for some time."

Tony suddenly realised silence had fallen and he looked up to see the ice-cold glare of Gibbs focused on him.

"I'm sorry Boss, I didn't mean it like that, it's just that-"

"Save it DiNozzo. I don't want to hear another word."

Tony grimaced at his own inability to think before he spoke and settled back into the uncomfortable atmosphere for the last hour of the flight.

As soon as the plane stopped moving, Gibbs stepped out of the door into the darkness of the night, heading across the tarmac towards a waiting car headlights.

Ziva and Tony hurried along behind him, trying their best not to get left behind in the wake of their boss' fury.

"Agent Gibbs, I'm Petty Officer Calligan, I'll be your driver whilst you're in Miami."

"I don't need a driver; I just need the wagon."

"I'm afraid that's non-negotiable. Director Vance has also ordered me to not disclose the location that you will be heading to so as you cannot - in his words - 'do one of your usual tricks' and run riot in Miami. No disrespect sir."

Gibbs growled at the nerve of Leon.

"Fine, but get us there quickly or I swear you'll spend the rest of your career in a recruitment office."

"Sir yes sir."

The soldier quickly headed around to the driver's door and got in, starting the engine and driving away as soon as Tony shut the door behind himself.

* * *

"OK, you got to admit, WitSec have some amazing properties. This place is gorgeous," mused Tony as they stepped out the car in front of Jenny's house.

The bungalow was right on the seafront and would have views across the coast during daylight, but as Gibbs approached the front door, his eye was drawn to the slightly ajar entrance.

"Guns..." he said quietly and carefully opened the front door before stepping inside.

As he flipped on a light, the scene that greeted Gibbs did not help the nerves he felt in his gut.

"She fought hard Gibbs," said Ziva as she surveyed the overturned chairs, table and smashed mirror.

"Yeah, but they fought back just as much. Come on."

Gibbs continued down the corridor, stepping over dislodged photo frames and discarded books.

The first door on the corridor led to a bathroom which had been untouched but the second door showed the epicentre of the fighting.

"They got her in bed. Oh come on, that's not playing fair"

Tony stepped around Gibbs and began surveying the mess.

The bedding had been thrown on the floor, her photographs and clothes were ripped and destroyed around the room and the bed itself seemed to have been moved during the struggle.

"Remember what they said? She saved a girl in the alley? Why was she here?"

Ziva looked to Gibbs as she asked, hoping he would have a theory.

"They must've let her go free Ziva, then followed her back here and got her when she was asleep. Although obviously she was still not as easy a target as they'd thought even then."

"Yeah, I'd say. Boss look, blood spatters."

Tony pointed to the trail of blood on the wall.

"That's not a lot of blood, probably a nose of something being bust."

"Sounds right Tony, the easiest move for a woman against a man who is attempting to take her by force is to go for the nose. It also leaves some evidence and DNA in the place of the attack. I taught her that in Cairo."

"Yeah, you two worked there together didn't you?"

Tony had tried to get information about the pair's history out of Ziva before with no success and, once again, she ignored the thinly veiled curiosity.

Gibbs' phone began to ring as Tony turned to him.

"So what now Boss? She's not here, what are we gonna do?"

Gibbs flipped open his phone and answered, leaving Tony's question hanging in the air.

"Abs, what you got for me?"

Ziva and Tony couldn't hear the reply from Abby but, by the calm look that passed over Gibbs' face, they knew it couldn't be anything good.

After a few moments he hung up and turned, walking straight out of the room, Ziva and Tony once again left to trail after him.

"Boss, what did Abby say?"

"She knows where Jenny is."


	5. Chapter 4

**Just as a warning, this is one point where the story will absolutely earn it's M rating. Although nothing is explicitly described, there are major themes of violence and rape. So, for your own consideration, please do not read if this will possibly upset you.**

Whilst Gibbs and the team had been checking out Jenny's new home, Abby and Tim had been trying their hardest to crack the encryptions around the message they had received.

It was now almost 10pm and had now been almost 12 hours since the first video had been received.

They knew that when the deadline passed, there would likely be another message.

They could only hope that there was some sort of clue in Jenny's home as to where they had taken her.

"McGee, how long until the deadline?"

"Five minutes Abby, but I'm sure we'll not get a message until they have a chance to double check that Gibbs didn't send the money in the first 12 hours."

The pair shared a look before continuing with their work.

"Hey, Tim, what about the IP address?"

"Abby, that was literally the second thing I checked. It's disguised."

"Disguised, not non-existent. What about if we could trace the software they used to hide their IP? Then we might find a backdoor in through the system and could then trace their location from that."

"That... might actually work Abby, I'll start a program on that now."

Abby smiled as she watched Tim begin to type rapidly and concentrate, occasionally murmuring to himself, before she turned back to her own work.

The pair were so focused on their tasks that they almost missed the beep on the computer.

"Was that?" Abby looked at Tim, worried about what the message could contain.

"I'll check."

Tim clicked into the email system and, sure enough, another email was sitting waiting for their attention, the bold lettering seeming more sinister as Tim clicked on the message.

"It's a live stream. They've added a live stream connection this time."

"Open it Tim, I need to see that she's still OK."

Tim clicked on the link and the pair waited with bated breath as the picture resolved itself into an image of a room.

It was not the same one where Jenny had been held captive before, that being a white walled room, but instead it seemed to look like an older building made with brick walls.

"Abby, start running a track on this. Maybe we'll get lucky and they'll have left some signature on this, it's harder to hide the identity of a live stream location than it is a video."

Abby quickly began typing at the next keyboard, her eyes not leaving the video footage that was playing.

The room was empty at this point, with the exception of a light overhead and a couple of loops on the walls. McGee didn't want to speculate about their purpose but he was sure that their uses were far from benign.

"Why are they just sending us blank footage? Have they sent us the wrong link or something?" asked Abby anxiously, the program for tracking the signal now running.

"No, I think they're going to bring her in here, they're just not quite ready."

The pair watched anxiously and Tim was both relieved and scared to see his prediction proved correct as Jenny suddenly stumbled into their view.

"Tim, what have they done to her?" Abby breathed, tears building in her eyes.

Tim remembered that Abby hadn't actually watched the video previously, and tried to comfort her.

"Abby, she looked like this in the first video. I'm pretty sure there's not any major new injuries."

On the screen, Jenny turned to face what they assumed was the doorway into the room and stood resolute and seemingly fearless, which would prove difficult to do so cuffed and gagged in a hostage situation, unless you were Jenny it would seem.

The two young colleagues stood shoulder-to-shoulder as Jenny paid close attention to something off screen.

It was only when she began to turn her head from side to side that two men became visible from opposing sides of the room, and a third stepped forward towards Jenny.

"There's three of them?" asked Abby.

"I don't want to sound pessimistic, but I think there's more. None of them have tattoos like the man in the first video. I think this whole thing is bigger than we thought."

"Not helpful McGee. What are they doing?"

The three men on camera were all moving in closer to Jenny, forcing her to step backwards slowly to try and stay as far from them as possible. But, soon enough, Jenny's back hit the brick wall.

"Come on Jenny, you gotta fight," asserted Abby, but Tim could see the worry clearly on the Forensic scientist's face.

It seemed that Jenny had reached the same conclusions as Abby however as she suddenly launched her body weight forward into one of the men.

She managed to throw him off balance enough so that she could try and dart through the space between him and the man nearest him.

Jenny began to run for the door when the second man lunged at her and, thanks to his extra height on the redhead, he grabbed her around the waist and forced her to the concrete floor.

"Oh god no..." moaned Abby.

"Abs, you don't have to watch this. You could just focus on the search?"

Tim was trying to find a way to distract Abby, particularly as he saw Jenny being turned onto her back and the man holding her moved forward to straddle her hips.

"No, I can't not watch. If I don't watch then I'm just going to think the worst, and I'll know it's still playing and then I'll just have no concentration cause I'll want to watch and then I'll never be any help in finding her at all anyway. So no Timmy, thanks but I need to watch. I need her to be OK."

As the tears finally began to roll down Abby's cheeks, Tim wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close.

"OK, we'll watch together."

Tim didn't let go and Abby gratefully sunk into his side, her arms wrapping around his waist, hoping to find some level of comfort there as they watched their friend in danger and hoped she would find a way out soon.

The video was unrelenting to their wishes and they could only watch as the other two men moved to hold Jenny down.

The man who was sat on top of her reached forward and ripped her vest top hard, pulling it away from her body until it no longer hindered access to her upper body.

As Jenny's shirt was ripped away from her, Abby heard a quiet groan.

"McGee, is the sound on?"

Pressing a couple of keys, Tim raised the volume on the video and the pair realised that they could now hear everything going on in the room. Not all of which was comforting.

"-used to this slut. It's your own fault you're here so now deal with the consequences."

The snarl that fell from behind the gag sounded almost feral.

"Oooh the kitten does have claws. I think we'll have to tame this wild thing before she goes anywhere, right guys?"

The three men laughed cruelly as Jenny tried to toss her torso under the large man.

"Oh sweetie those moves might work on some little wimp but not on us, we've done this before. So just... lie back and enjoy yourself, as much as you can anyway cause you're gonna have to do it a lot more often very soon. Doesn't look like your Gibbs cares about you at all really, we've not had a single attempt at contact from him. Clearly he's pleased to see the back of you."

Abby could see the slight change in Jenny's expression.

"Oh no, Jenny, don't give up, he's coming. He'd never have stopped looking for you if he knew you were alive."

Abby whispered to the screen, wishing that the woman who became a surrogate mother to her could hear her.

Instead, she watched as the men made short work of Jenny's shorts, leaving her only in matching light blue lingerie.

Turning to Tim, Abby's voice was unsure and soft, something that Tim hadn't been aware she could be.

"They wouldn't... rape her, on camera, would they?"

Tim wished he could soothe Abby's worries, but he knew what was coming.

And it seemed, from the fall in her face, that Abby also knew what the likely outcome of the scenario was.

Jenny kept fighting, and managed to wrestle a wrist free from its captor, using it to rake across the first man's face, carving three gouges out of his cheek with her nails.

"You Bitch!"

A strong hand flew down on Jenny's cheek, the heavy backhand causing her neck to snap to the side and the cry of pain was barely muffled.

"You don't get to fight back, what part of that do you not understand? I think we need to really teach you this lesson, you don't seem to be able to understand words so I hope that actions will speak louder."

Pulling a short knife from his back pocket, the leader of the group grinned when he saw Jenny suddenly still under him.

"Ah, so I see we understand that this can cause pain. Good. But you need to learn we can cause you pain in many ways, and that's something you're going to have to learn. Starting now."

Using the short knife, the man quickly sliced away Jenny's remaining protection, leaving her completely vulnerable.

"You know, for an older woman, you are one fit lady. I mean you're what, early 40's? Your body is ten times better than some women half your age that I've seen. Wonder if all of you is quite as fit and tight."

As the man finally moved off Jenny's hips, he reached for his belt.

"No, don't! McGee, how do we stop it?"

Abby finally broke, tears flowing down her cheeks as she watched the fear on Jenny's face as the man moved between her legs, still brandishing the knife at her.

Tim could only hold her close as they watched the man release his belt and begin to undo his trousers.

As he finally bent forward over Jenny, the screen suddenly went black.

"McGee, what happened? Get it back!"

"They turned the camera off."

"Wait what? Why would they do that?"

"Maybe to scare us all. We know what is going to happen but, if we can't see it, we can't tell if it actually did happen. But it could be a way for them to try and push Gibbs to pay the ransom."

"Gibbs... the tracking program!"

Abby had forgotten for a moment about their trace on the cameras.

Turning to her trusted machines, Abby almost passed out in joy.

"McGee, we found it! The trace worked, we got into the system. I need to tell Gibbs!"

Abby quickly grabbed her mobile and pressed speed dial for Gibbs.

"Abby, don't tell him what we saw, just say we traced the first email. He doesn't need to know."

Tim spoke quickly before Gibbs answered his mobile.

Abby's eyes grew wide before she nodded to Tim, agreeing that telling Gibbs what they had just witnessed would do no-one any good, especially the men holding Jenny, although Abby personally hoped hell would rain down on them when Gibbs got his hands on them.

"Hi, Gibbs. We found her."


	6. Chapter 5

"Gibbs, I can't just let you go off."

"You are not Petty Officer. I commandeered the car and left you behind."

"Nope, not happening."

Both Tony and Ziva flinched as they saw the icy stare being levelled at the young marine. However, to his credit, Calligan didn't move a muscle.

"Sir, I was tasked with keeping you safe. Where ever you're going, surely it won't hurt to have another gun."

Gibbs continued to stare at the younger man for several moments before turning on his heel and marching off to the car.

"You get us to the address in fifteen minutes, alright?"

"I can do it in thirteen Sir," said Calligan sharply, almost running to the driver's side of the car, sensing Gibbs would not be kind to any sort of delay.

Tony and Ziva shared a look before following behind, climbing into the car swiftly.

As the car pulled away from Jenny's house, all three agents automatically pulled out their guns and checked they were loaded and ready before the four sat in an intense silence during their entire drive. For once, Tony didn't even attempt to lighten the mood with one of the many film references he knew about Miami.

He knew that Gibbs would not be averse to shooting anyone right now and he was not planning on being on the end of one of Gibbs' legendary bullets anytime soon.

* * *

"This is the address Sir," Calligan stopped the car outside an old derelict looking warehouse, "the office building is actually the one you want, but I stopped here to stop quite so much interest in us immediately."

The only acknowledgement he received was a small nod as Gibbs opened the car door and moved from the car, the others once against left trailing after him.

Gibbs stopped at the corner of the warehouse and quickly evaluated the building.

"Ziva, with me, we'll go in the front way. Tony, you and Calligan go around the back and check for another entrance. If not, follow us in the front. Keep an eye out for guards, we know there's some sort of organisation behind this rather than an individual. Now, go."

All four withdrew their guns from their holsters and stealthily approached the building. Gibbs took point and carefully cracked the front door of the building open, which was surprisingly left unlocked.

Creeping down the inside wall, Gibbs noted the state-of-the-art security cameras along the corridor.

"Fast Ziva," he whispered sharply, nodding towards the camera.

Ziva only nodded her agreement before she took over from Gibbs, leading them down the corridor.

They reached a staircase where Gibbs listened for any signs of life. Hearing footsteps on the floor above them, Gibbs decided to head down the stairs, quickly reaching the floor below.

Here, the appearance of the building changed.

Whilst the floor above looked quite well maintained and professional, this floor had been left without such care and attention. The paint on the walls was crumbling away and the floor looked dirty and unswept.

However, what attracted Gibbs' attention was the fact that every door on this floor was shut and had a lock on the outside.

Silently approaching the first door, Gibbs peered through the small window at the top of the door and saw two young women inside, both wearing only ill-fitting t-shirts and panties. Both seemed to be attached to the wall by chains and collars around their necks. Neither woman looked to be older than 25 and both looked unkept and terrified.

"Ziva," said Gibbs turning from the window, "we need back-up here now. Tell Calligan to radio the police and get their asses here now. This is bigger than we thought."

Ziva pulled out her radio and quickly relayed the message to the other two men as Gibbs continued down the corridor, checking every room. It was clear that the glass was one way as not one woman in any of the room showed any recognition of a face at the window.

Gibbs was disgusted by what he could see. All of the young women looked to have been beaten and assaulted. Many sported ugly bruises or blood stains on their clothing and all were anchored to a wall of their make-shift cells.

Gibbs had checked a further 7 rooms before Ziva caught up to him.

There were only three rooms left on the floor and Gibbs was moving faster to each door.

When he reached the 9th cell, he stopped abruptly.

Without a further thought, he pointed his handgun at the padlock on the cell and fired one shot, shattering the lock.

Quickly undoing the latch, Gibbs pushed the door open and stepped inside, followed immediately by Ziva who couldn't help her gasp of horror.

"Jenny!"

* * *

Jenny was lying motionless in the corner of the room, naked.

Her hair was spread over her outstretched arm as she lay face down on the cold concrete flooring. Around her neck was a steel collar which was, like with all the other women they had seen, attached by chain to a link embedded in the wall.

Ziva ran straight past Gibbs to Jenny's side, removing her jacket as she moved. Ziva carefully laid the jacket over Jenny's torso, trying to give her a modicum of decency in her current position.

Moving her hand to Jenny's neck, Ziva next checked for a pulse, and it was only when Ziva looked up with a soft sigh of relief that Gibbs finally unfroze and moved to the two women.

"We need to get the collar off of her," said Ziva, "but I can't see how. It has been welded shut."

Gibbs looked and saw that she was right. Someone had soldered together the two halves of the collar, meaning that Jenny would be unable to escape from the collar.

"What about the chain?" asked Gibbs gruffly, noticing Ziva was scanning the entire length of the cold metal.

"It's been padlocked on. And this is a heavy duty thing Gibbs, I don't think you can just shoot it off. We need the key."

Ziva's radio crackled into life.

"Ziva, where are you?" came Tony's voice, "Calligan's gone back out front to get the locals, they're only two minutes away."

"We're in the basement. The only open door."

"OK, I'll be there in a moment."

Ziva put the radio on the ground as she looked around for some way to remove the barbaric contraption from her friend.

* * *

"McGee, come here, the video's back!"

Abby's frantic call had Tim scrambling from his seat towards the monitor.

"Did you manage to hack it?" asked Tim, impressed by Abby's skill.

"No, it just turned back on. And look, they've found her, Gibbs and Ziva have found her!"

"Why aren't they getting out?"

Tim could just sense that something wasn't right and, trusting Gibbs' infamous theory about his gut, Tim grabbed his cell phone and called Tony.

"Tony, where are you?" he asked quickly as soon as Tony answered.

"Going to meet Ziva and the Boss, they've found-"

"They've found Jenny, we know. We can see them, on a video stream. I think something's about to go wrong. Just, hurry and get there. Stay safe."

Tim hung up and turned to Abby.

"Abby, what's happening?"

Abby looked to him, fire in her eyes.

"They have her chained up, like some feral dog or something. And Ziva said something about it being attached. They can't get her free. She's a sitting duck there McGee."

Tim's bad gut feeling only intensified as he saw four men storm into the room, each pointing a weapon at the three in the corner.

"They wanted us to watch this, didn't they?" said Abby, and Tim knew that she didn't need confirmation. Whoever was controlling the video wanted them to witness the fact that they couldn't save Jenny.

That not even Gibbs could save his love.


	7. Chapter 6

The moment that McGee had hung up, Tony had pulled out his gun and now held it in front of himself as he scanned the building.

Making his way into the stairway, he cautiously looked up, only to hear heavy boots coming down the stairs towards him.

Tony stepped back into the ground floor, his back pressed up against the wall as he let the four men pass him by as they ran towards the cellar and Tony's team.

Tony waited until they were at the other end of the corridor before he pulled out his radio and called Calligan.

"The cavalry here yet?"

"Just pulling up now."

"Good, get your ass in here, there's four gun men and they just went running past me to where Gibbs has found Jenny."

"On my way now."

Tony silently descended the flight of stairs and found the corridor where light was spilling from one of the furthest rooms.

Just as he went to enter the corridor, he was aware of a presence behind him.

Turning his head, he saw the Petty Officer behind him, weapon drawn.

Nodding soundlessly, Tony and Calligan continued down the corridor, before both taking up positions on one side of the cell door, ready for a signal.

* * *

"Well then Agent Gibbs, it seems we were wrong about you, you do care. Enough to get yourself killed. Although this one with you, she's almost as pretty as your Jenny. I think we'll keep her as well."

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," said Gibbs casually, not betraying any sense of nerves at the situation, "she's a Mossad assassin. She probably knows 47 ways to kill you all with your own guns."

"It is 67 Gibbs. And all without firing a single bullet."

A dangerous smile graced Ziva's lips and Gibbs could tell that at least one of the men there was unsettled by Ziva.

"Still Gibbs, what did you expect would happen when you came here? You would waltz in, pick up your Damsel and leave again? Not going to happen."

"Well that's a shame. Because that's exactly what I am planning on doing. It is what happens in the middle that I am a little vague on. And whether or not you make things harder than they need to be. So you could all just... walk out the door and let us go."

The cocking of at least one of the guns in the room seemed to nullify that option.

"Gibbs, you will die here. And your friends back home will watch as it happens."

The first gunman gestured to a small security camera in the corner.

As Gibbs looked up, he saw a shadow move in the corridor and he was sure that back-up had arrived.

"Well, we seem to be at an impasse. What do you suggest should happen then?"

"I have had enough of this. You know, it's a shame that Jenny won't ever know that you tried to save her. She'll do exactly as we want her to do and think you didn't care."

The last jibe at Gibbs was the final straw and all of Team Gibbs knew it.

Before the gunmen could react, Gibbs and Ziva brought up their weapons and fired on the first two men whilst Tony and Calligan took out the final pair. All four men fell to the ground, two with thigh injuries and the second two with bullets through their arms.

Tony and Ziva moved quickly to confiscate their weapons and, with Calligan's help, secured the men before searching them.

"Found keys Gibbs," called Tony, throwing the keys to his boss.

"I'm going to go and find out where the cops are, they should be here by now," said Calligan as he stood and exited the room.

Gibbs began to check every key in the padlock. All the keys were similar sizes, so Gibbs surmised that they were the keys for all the girls' padlocks, which meant that Gibbs had to try every one to find Jenny's.

It was the fourth key that fit into the lock on Jenny's padlock and Gibbs quickly pulled the chain from the wall, moving it down to her side.

Moving back so he was in front of Jenny's head, Gibbs softly stroked a few strands of hair out of Jenny's face before his hand moved to cradle her bruised cheek gently.

"I've got you Jenny, you're safe now, I promise."

Gibbs didn't have the opportunity to say anymore as an ambulance crew entered the room and came to assess Jenny, quickly deciding that she needed to be taken immediately to the nearest hospital.

Without a word of discussion, Ziva and Tony knew that Gibbs would be accompanying her and that they would be staying to deal with the situation in the hell hole they had stumbled across.

The three walked out to the ambulance with Jenny and Gibbs turned to the pair as he went to climb inside.

Before he could speak, Ziva began.

"We'll stay and look after the scene Gibbs, and get all of these girls freed. We'll come and find you at the hospital when we get there, but I doubt we'll see you in the next six hours. Look after her."

Gibbs simply nodded his head and climbed in beside Jenny, taking her hand as Ziva and Tony shut the doors to the Ambulance and it quickly drove off, the blue lights blaring in the dark night.

* * *

"Where is she? Is she OK? Can we see her?"

Ziva turned towards the barrage of questions as Abby and McGee came speeding down the corridor towards them.

Both Ziva and Tony had been sitting in the waiting room for the past 2 hours, waiting to be allowed to see Jenny and Gibbs, the latter of whom was refusing to leave the redhead's side.

"Abby, calm down, we don't know yet. The last that we heard from Gibbs, she was stable and simply unconscious however they were in need of doing some more tests on Jenny before we were to be allowed to see her. How did you get here so fast?" asked Ziva of the pair, and Tim had the good grace to look slightly abashed.

"We may have commandeered a couple of seats on a red-eye out here at about 2am. So we just got in and this young marine brought us up here. He knew what the situation was so got us here quickly."

"His name Calligan?" asked Tony.

"Already met him?"

"He helped us find Jenny. Nice guy."

"Yeah, he gave us his number in case we needed any sort of assistance down here."

"Well right now it'll be a while before any of us are leaving I'm sure."

Abby sat down beside Ziva and the Israeli wrapped her hand around the younger woman's shoulders.

"She'll be fine Abby, I'm sure. It's Jenny we're talking about. She survived being shot four times only 3 years ago."

"I know, but I just worry. Not just about her, but also about Gibbs. They're like our mum and dad and when they're not together they're not happy. Gibbs hasn't been like he was while she was here since she's gone. But now, now I think they'll help each other get better."

"We can only hope so Abby," said Tony and the four sat down to wait for any news to come their way.


	8. Chapter 7

Their news didn't arrive until around 10am. The doctor came down the corridor, walking towards them with purpose that they knew that this visit was intended for them.

Standing to greet the doctor, Tony asked what was happening.

"So we have been treating Miss Shepard's injuries overnight. She has given me permission to discuss her injuries freely with you as I understand you are investigating her disappearance."

Tony's nod allowed the Doctor to continue.

"She had several broken ribs, lacerations across her entire body and deep bruising. She was also violated brutally and needed several stitches internally in her vaginal canal."

Both Ziva and Abby winced. The group had been clinging to the hope that Jenny had managed to escape that final indignation despite what they had seen on the video footage, but the confirmation that their boss had been violated in the worst way hurt both women intensely, and they both felt even more for Jenny.

"Is there anything else we should be aware of?"

"When Miss Shephard was discovered she was unconscious I do believe. It took her over two hours to regain consciousness once she arrived her but her head wound has given us a cause for concern, hence the reason for our delay in allowing you to visit with her. Hopefully she will be fine but we cannot tell until we give her an MRI scan later this afternoon. She seems to have suffered no permanent damage however and has full cognitive capabilities."

"Good, that sounds..."

"I know that this all sounds like a lot and, honestly, Miss Shephard does not look at her best at the moment. However, she will recover from her injuries, hopefully completely, within a six-week period. Which, all things considered, is pretty miraculous. Miss Shephard is one lucky lady."

"Nah, she's a fighter. Literally. You never want to get on the wrong side of her I can promise you."

The Doctor smiled softly at the group continuing.

"If you wish, you can come along to her room now. Although I can only allow two of you to join Mr Gibbs-"

"Just Gibbs."

"Sorry, just Gibbs, there are seats outside that you can wait in which are closer to her than you are currently and you can keep a closer eye on what is happening."

"Thanks very much Doctor, this means a lot for us. The team has been missing Jenny for a long time and I think everyone just wants to be as close as they possibly can right now. We don't want her to disappear on us again."

"I can see that you're all close. I just hope that you can all support each other and Jennifer through this."

"Oh we will," vowed Abby, her passion making the others smile.

When they arrived outside Jenny's private room, the doctor left them.

"OK, girls, you want to go in first?" said Tony.

"Do you not want to visit with her?" asked Ziva, unsure of why Tony would volunteer to let them go first.

"Ziva, Jenny's just been through a horrific experience, and the worst of it was perpetrated against her by men. And whilst Tim is the biggest softie, we are both of the male species. And I think we'd be best to make sure that she's cognizant of her surroundings before we steam in and make the whole situation worse."

"Oh Tony, there is a heart under all that sleaze," teased Ziva, although in truth she was touched that he would think of their friend's own needs so carefully.

"Hey now, don't you be getting all slushy on me Ziva, I need my big, bad Mossad assassin to help me kick some ass later on."

"Yes Boss," teased Ziva before turning to Abby and gesturing that the taller woman should proceed into the room.

* * *

Inside the room, Abby stepped up to the bed and let her eyes analyse what she could see of their former boss.

Even though she was injured and hooked up to several machines, Abby was pleased to see that Jenny didn't looked dwarfed in the bed like people so often did.

Instead, Jenny was sat up in the bed, her back supported by several pillows whilst her left hand was held by Gibbs.

"Jenny, you're OK! Well, not OK, but you're not dead. As in you didn't die in the shoot-out the first time, and now you're back here, in our lives, not that you'd died this time around if you understand me."

Jenny laughed as Abby tailed off, wringing her hands nervously.

"Oh I've missed you Abby, come here!" Jenny held her free arm out, gesturing Abby to come forward.

"Are you sure? I mean I don't want to injure you, and you have got a couple of cracked ribs and I'm rubbish at careful hugs."

"Abby, I've gone almost 4 years without an Abby hug, I think my body will heal better having had one."

Abby didn't need any more prodding and quickly stepped up beside the bed and wrapped her arms around the diminutive redhead.

She held on tight for several moments before stepping back, and both women had tears shining in their eyes.

Abby smiled at Jenny once again before stepping to the side, allowing Ziva to move forward and take her place.

"Shalom Jenny, I am pleased to see you are in one part."

"Piece Ziva," Jenny automatically responded and then smiled at the grin she saw on Ziva's face, knowing it was her friend's unique way of bringing a little cheer to the situation.

"I hear that it is thanks to you, both of you that I am here," said Jenny, indicating that Gibbs had clearly been filling her in on what had happened in the events preceding her rescue.

"It was mainly Abby and Gibbs' efforts that led to your emancipation," said Ziva.

"Hey now, I thought we had this discussion before, don't play down your own abilities and contributions. If Gibbs gave you praise, you should know by now to take it with both hands and not let go until he Gibbs slaps you again."

"That is true," laughed Ziva, looking at Gibbs who merely shrugged at their teasing.

"But I feel I need to give my own praise as well Ziva, Abby. Thank you so very much for everything. If it wasn't for you, I would most likely be on my way to a miserable life as a sex slave somewhere. And before you say it wouldn't have happened, they gave me some very detailed descriptions of what they planned on doing to me before they sold me on. Apparently women of my calibre do very well on the black market and I likely would've been bought by some Prince or Senator to be kept in a locked mansion as their plaything."

Both Abby and Ziva shuddered at the matter of fact tone Jenny used to describe the possible outcome, but, watching Jenny, they could see that she had come to accept what had nearly become her fate.

Changing the subject from the slightly more morose, Jenny asked, "where are the boys?"

No-one needed to ask who she was referring to. Gibbs looked to the two women with the same question in his eyes, looking ready to jump up and hunt the two men down if the answer was not satisfactory.

"The Doctor would not allow any more than two of us to visit with you at any one time," began Ziva, "but they also wanted us to test the waters with you. We are aware of what happened to you whilst in captivity and they didn't want you to feel threatened or uncomfortable about their presence."

"Threatened by McGee and DiNozzo, that'll be the day," Jenny snorted, "that was very sweet of them and I understand it is good standard operating practice but we all know, particularly you Ziva, that I am not a standard victim."

"Indeed." Ziva knew to what Jenny was referring but she did not know where the others stood with such information so kept her answer short.

"And I know you're all trying your best to not get kicked out of the hospital, but I want you to go and find the guys now and bring them in here, I need to talk to you all."

Ziva nodded before turning and stepping back outside the room.

* * *

Turning to the chairs, she could see both of her friends sat there, waiting for some news. Both men looked up when she approached them, curiosity burning across their faces.

"She wants to see you," was all that Ziva needed to say for the pair to bounce to their feet and follow Ziva back into the private room.

"Tony, Tim, I'm glad to see you."

"You too Director," said Tim automatically.

"I haven't been Director in several years Tim, it's Jenny now. Although I haven't been in Jenny in a long time either."

"Yeah, you were Kat? What was Kat like then?" asked Tony, enjoying being able to tease the redhead once again.

"Well Kat was a Pilates instructor and surfer."

"No way! Although you do look extra fit at the moment Jenny, I will give you that."

"Tony..." growled Gibbs from his seat and Ziva slapped Tony across the back of the head as a courtesy of Gibbs who seemed unwilling to move from Jenny's side to inflict the move himself.

"Yep boss, shutting up," said Tony, remembering why he hated Ziva's head slaps more than Gibbs'.

"I wanted to thank you both for what you did today. I already thanked the girls but I needed to tell you personally that I am so grateful for everything that you did. Particularly you Tim."

Tim looked a little stunned at being singled out.

"Gibbs has been talking to your substitute back at headquarters and they were reviewing the footage. I know how horrific that must have been and you no doubt viewed it with professionalism and supported Abby at the same time."

Abby moved to stand beside Tim and threw her arms around his neck.

"Yeah, thanks for that Timmy, couldn't have done it without you."

"Just... doing my job, but thank you."

The room fell into a moment of silence before Tony turned to Gibbs.

"Gibbs, we secured the scene and rescued the girls but we found paperwork which indicates that the guys we caught were just the middle management. There were emails with orders that they were to execute and the operation traces back several years. I think this is something we need to turn over to the FBI now."

"Agreed, this is way out of our jurisdiction now. I'm sure Fornell will love this case when we hand it to him on a silver platter. Shame really that we'll have to see him again."

"Jethro stop," chided Jenny softly, "we all know that the pair of you are friends these days more than anything else. Besides, both of you have a common loss I do believe at the moment."

"How did you know?"

"I may have been unable to communicate with you all, but that doesn't mean I couldn't read the papers online and see what was happening in my old stomping ground. But it also told me about Diane... and Mike. I'm sorry Jethro that he's gone."

"Yeah well, it's his fault really that we found you."

"What do you mean?"

"He knew you were alive. He told me himself when he died. He wouldn't give me a name but I worked out it had to be you but just didn't see how. Then the first message came through. I knew that it wasn't a hoax then and there."

"I'm glad. I can't imagine what might've happened if you hadn't believed it."

"I don't want to imagine."

Gibbs and Jenny had focused in only on each other, almost entirely forgetting the presence of the other four members of the team in the room. Abby grinned as she watched the pair bond once more but she then turned and hinted to the others wordlessly that they should leave. The four traipsed out of the room as quietly as possible, trying their best not to disturb the tender moment occurring inside.

However, their exit was not as subtle as they had wished.

"Think this is them hinting something to us?" asked Jenny, her eyes sparkling.

"Maybe."

Jenny just laughed at Gibbs' reluctance to answer more thoroughly before sobering with a thought.

"You know; I really did miss you. There were so many times I almost picked up the phone and called you, or jumped in a car and drove to your house and sat waiting in your basement for you to return. I just missed seeing you all the time, sharing coffee, rubbing each other up the wrong way-"

"Constantly."

"Perhaps, but it was still something we did together."

"Well hopefully it's something that we can do again together now."

"I doubt I'll get my job back as Director Jethro," said Jenny, knowing full what he meant but testing the waters as to how he felt.

"I didn't ever date the Director Jen, I dated Probie Jenny. And that's the woman that I want to do all those things with again, if she'll let me."

Jenny was speechless, which allowed Gibbs to continue.

"You know, the one thing I noticed about Kat's place that let me know that it was your place immediately was that it was you who lived there. The place was decorated with Paris in mind. Images of the Eiffel Tower, the blend of tea that we drank in Paris, the striped bedsheets. I knew then that you didn't forget me, much like I hadn't forgotten you. On my desk, there's photos of us from the past several years, before you disappeared. Abby put them there one day and I realised then that, even though you were gone, I missed you as much as I missed Kelly and Shannon. And I realised then the mistake I had made in letting you stay 'on the job'."

"Jethro, I hate to admit it, but you were right, we never should have stayed 'on the job'. If I hadn't insisted upon it, I can only dream about how happy we would've been together."

"Maybe not. maybe this separation has been what we needed to make this last this time. II certainly hope so."

"You... you do?" Jenny couldn't help the hopeful note that entered her voice.

"Jen, I only have to ask one thing."

"What?"

"Are we 'off the job' yet?"

Jenny didn't bother to reply, instead carefully wrapping her arm around Gibbs' neck and pulling him towards her, their lips connecting again for the first time in years.

Gibbs almost moaned as he felt the softness of Jenny's lips before he pressed them tighter together, the long-lost passion reigniting as their embrace continued.

It was only when the door to the room opened softly that the pair pulled apart, Jenny blushing prettily whilst Gibbs' smug grin was firmly plastered across his cheeks.

Gibbs looked up to see Tony stood in the doorway, cringing already at the berating he was about to receive.

"What is it Tony?" asked Jenny quickly, knowing Gibbs' temper just as well as Tony.

"We just heard from the FBI, they want to interview Jenny as soon as possible, make sure they can catch any remnants in the city now before they all go to ground."

"They'll be long gone by now DiNozzo, and Fornell knows that. He just wants to cause trouble like normal."

"Jethro, we can't put this off. When I was there, the things I heard from the other rooms... I don't even really want to think about it all, it scares me to think how bad I could've had it."

"Jen, they raped you. I don't see how it could've gotten much worse?"

Jethro was amazed at Jen's empathy despite her own horrific ordeal but she continues to speak to Tony.

"Tell Tobias that I will be ready for an interview in 30 minutes' time if he is willing to deal with taking the interview here with Jethro present. I will not have any other agents present, just the three of us and a tape recorder if necessary. I will also acquiesce to Jethro's request that I get rest after that so he will have to make it quick. Make sure he understands this Tony."

"Yes Ma'am... I mean Direc-... I mean, Jenny."

"Not your Boss anymore Tony. Although hopefully you will consider me a friend."

"Of course Jenny, and I'm sure I'll also consider you my boss' girlfriend before too long," he added cheekily, ducking out of the room as Gibbs glared at him stonily.

"Oh come on Jethro, like he means anything by it. I'm pleased to see that the team seemed to have bonded even more since I've been gone."

"They bonded because you were gone Jenny. You were the glue between them all before but, when you 'died', they still needed each other and learnt how to rely upon each other."

"And a little more I would say."

"What do you mean by that?" asked Gibbs sharply.

"Oh come on, Tim and Abby? You're surely not that oblivious to the pair of them."

"They better not. He knows better," growled Gibbs, a realisation dawning over him.

"So I guess I probably shouldn't mention that I believe that Tony and Ziva have grown infinitely closer as well?"

"Does no-one respect Rule 12 anymore?" asked Gibbs, throwing his arms up in frustration.

"Jethro, how can you expect them to follow such rules when you yourself don't hold up an exactly stellar example? I mean, come on, even when we worked together, it was clear that Rule 12 was not being enforced."

"Rule 12 was created because of you Jen, not for you."

"Yeah well, your team tried to follow that for long enough. I'd suggest it might be time to find a new number 12. Maybe… treat your other halves perfectly or you'll have to deal with the wrath of... Mum and Dad?"

Jenny's eyes twinkled as Gibbs just groaned as he remembered Abby's nickname for the pair of them.

"She's never going to forget about that now, I hope you realise. We're going to be called Mum and Dad for years."

"What's so wrong with that?" asked Jenny.

"How about... I'm their boss, you used to be my boss and they really should show us some more respect than that?"

"Jethro, I tend to find that people have more respect for their family than they do their colleagues. I take such affection as proof that they really do actually like us and care about us. I certainly would've been proud to call any one of them my child."

Jenny cursed herself as she said her final words, her brain finally kicking in.

"I'm... I'm sorry Jethro, I wasn't thinking."

However, Gibbs didn't immediately respond.

"You know, I didn't even realise that the team had really become my surrogate children until now," said Gibbs softly. "When I lost Kelly I thought I'd never feel such an emotional attachment to someone again. But the team, they've kinda filled that gap."

"I'm glad Jethro. I had hoped you'd notice that before now but it seems that your brain wasn't quite willing to compute that possibility, which is a fair point. But now, now I think that the team still need you, emotionally as well as in your capacity as team leader."

"How did you suddenly come to be so philosophical Jen? What happened to my stubborn, fiery Probie?"

"She taught Pilates and Yoga for 4 years." Jenny laughed softly at that, seeing a grin on Jethro's face.

"Yoga huh? So you're pretty flexible then?"

"I've always been flexible Jethro."

"Oh I remember, but it has been a while since I've tested that flexibility."

"And it will be a while still before you do again."

Jenny rolled her eyes as Gibbs seemed to wince as he remembered her injuries.

"Jethro, come on. I don't need you walking on eggshells around me, it'll be bad enough with the rest of the team doing so, never mind the person I'm planning on spending a lot of time with."

"Oh are you?"

"Well, the doctor told me that I'm not allowed to be by myself for the next week, just in case any of my injuries worsen. And I sure as hell am not staying here when there's now, hopefully, a place for me back in Washington with you."

"Jen, you don't even need to ask. Of course you're coming home with us... with me."

Jenny smiled softly as Gibbs leant forward and once again their lips connected. This time, although the passion was still there, they held it back, instead taking comfort from the once familiar movements and enjoying the closeness they were now feeling and rediscovering the joy of their intimate connection.


	9. Chapter 8

**Sorry about the delay, real life occasionally takes effect. Also, it'd be lovely to hear what everyone thought of the story so feel free to leave me a little review :)**

Two hours later the door to Jenny's room swung open without so much as a knock.

"Well, this is nice and cosy," drawled Tobias, taking in the view of Gibbs sitting on the bed behind Jenny, his arms wrapped around her waist as they talked softly to each other about nothing and everything.

"Tobias," said Jenny.

"Fornell," grimaced Gibbs, knowing he was in for a ribbing later.

"I do believe that I was requested for an interview."

"You were indeed," confirmed Jenny, "I don't want some green-tinged FBI agent attempting to grow a rapport with me and baby me during my testimony. I certainly won't get that from you."

"No, I don't do rapport with anyone."

"You don't say," added Gibbs, causing Jenny to have to hide her grin.

"Agent Gibbs, if you could excuse us then?"

"No, Jethro is staying here. I wasn't going to tell this story more than I have to so decided that I would wait until you arrived to tell Jethro."

"Back to Jethro, eh?" Fornell looked at Gibbs who shrugged slightly but with a smile playing around his lips. "Might I guess then Agent Gibbs' involvement is personal rather than professional?"

"You can guess all you like Tobias. But I would hope that an Agent such as yourself would rely only upon the evidence laid in front of them."

The rebuke was enough to convince Tobias to sit on the seat beside the bed and pull out his recorder.

"OK, so interview with... what name are we going by now then?"

"I'm back to being Jennifer Shepard now Tobias. However, I was known as Kat Joshua."

"Interesting choice. Suits you surprisingly well though."

"I'm glad it has your approval Tobias. Now please, can we begin?"

It took Jenny an hour to recount what had happened to her over the past week.

Gibbs was thankful to know that, before the first video was sent to him, she was basically left alone in the room that they found her in, only roughing her up to try and gain her compliance.

When they had worked out that she was no ordinary woman, that was when they had searched the internet for information about her and hit the jackpot in an image search.

The moment that they knew who they were dealing with, her beatings became more regular and violent, leading up to the video being sent.

When Jenny started to tell Gibbs about the video that had gone live when she was cornered by the three men in her cell, she told them both that she knew that someone was watching, one of her captors had let it slip, too excited by their plan to destroy her will and force her into submission.

Gibbs had sat silently throughout the whole interview, using his body to convey his support to Jenny.

It was only when she started to describe how the men stripped her and forced her to the ground that he squeezed Jenny involuntarily, causing her to gasp as he put pressure on her broken ribs.

"Sorry Jen," was all that Gibbs could say at that moment, trying his hardest to control the rising anger he could feel.

"Jethro, do you want me to stop?" Gibbs looked at Jenny incredulously.

"Jen, you're the one who's having to relive some of the worst days of your life and you're worried about me."

"Well, yes. I know what's coming next, I was there after all. But this is coming down on you like a tonne of bricks. It can't be easy."

"It's not."

"Well, do you want me to stop? Do you want to leave?"

"Jen, stop being such a goddamned martyr already and just hurry up and finish. The sooner we're done here, the sooner we can go home."

"We? Oh Gibbs, do I sense a wedding? Number... 5?"

"If you know what's good for you Tobias," said Jenny without giving the man a glance, "you'd keep your mouth shut. And that recorder better be off at the moment."

As much as Tobias liked to wind up both Gibbs and Jenny, he also had a lot of respect for the pair, and he had indeed turned off the recorder the moment the conversation became personal.

"Can we continue?" asked Tobias, "I'm getting bored with all this lovey-dovey nonsense."

"Very well." Jenny took a deep breath before continuing.

"The three men had me on the floor, naked and restrained, and the man who I had the most contact with throughout the entire ordeal decided he was going first. I got the feeling he was in charge of the store of girls as it were, but it's a much larger organisation. The man who was with me in the video the first time was definitely higher up the food chain."

"We've known about a trafficking ring in Miami for a couple of months now but we've never managed to track them down. I gotta say Gibbs, fancy lending us your tech witch for a couple of weeks, we'd have it all wrapped up then."

"That's tech Goth Fornell. And no, Abby will be going nowhere with you. You can work with her in NCIS but that's as far as she'll go."

"I'll keep that in mind. Please, continue."

"The lead captor knew how to best inflict pain with his pleasure it seemed and just... went for it. After that, the others all took their turn, although the first decided that he didn't like sloppy seconds apparently and decided that he wanted a fresh start, as it were. All in all, I was raped by three different men, four times."

Gibbs hated the matter of fact tone that Jenny was using and the fact that she had not shed a single tear over the entire event. He knew that she was repressing all of her emotions and he hoped that she would finally let herself fall apart now that he was there to catch her and pick up the pieces.

"After they'd all finished they just buckled up their pants and left, leaving me be for a while. But then two of them reappeared and decided that I needed even more bruises on my body, that I wasn't battered enough. That was when they broke my ribs and caused me concussion. Next thing I remember, I'm waking up in here with Jethro at my side, shouting at a load of nurses to do their jobs correctly."

Jenny looked to Gibbs who merely shrugged in defence.

"What? You'd been awake for at least 30 seconds and none of them had bothered to get their asses in here to check you over."

"Jethro, I wasn't exactly going anywhere, they knew that worst comes to worst I'd be a little confused for a few moments."

Gibbs could see Fornell grinning at his chastisement.

"You need anything more Fornell?" he growled.

"Not right now, but we'll no doubt be back in touch with you both sooner or later."

"Good, but how about you go and catch the bastards who think it's OK to kidnap and rape innocent women."

"Yes Gibbs, I will go and do my job. How about you do yours and look after your Director this time."

"Not the Director anymore Tobias," said Jenny softly.

"I'm not so sure about that," said Fornell with a mysterious smile, "I'm sure that when the politicians hear of your miraculous return they will be more than willing to welcome you back to your old job and their fancy shindigs."

"Oh I can hardly wait," deadpanned Jenny, causing both men to smile at her lack of political ambition at that moment, so different from when they knew her 4 years previously.

Gibbs couldn't help but notice that this was only one of the changes that had occurred to Jenny during her time in WitSec.

Her patience seemed to have grown immensely, her body seemed even leaner and fitter thanks to her active lifestyle that meant that she was continuously using her muscles, her hair and her complexion were sun-kissed and, in his eyes, her beauty had only grown in the time they had spent apart.

She also seemed to be far more serene than she had been during her last months as the Director.

All in all, as much as Gibbs hated to admit it, her time in Miami seemed to have suited her.

These thoughts consumed Gibbs as Tobias bid farewell to the pair of them and left the room, leaving Gibbs open to scrutiny from Jenny.

"What are you thinking about Jethro?" Jenny asked with a smirk, knowing that his thoughts more than likely were revolving around her at that moment.

"You. Well, you and Miami, and your job."

"I don't follow."

"You seem... better here. More like the probie that I trained rather than the Director I worked for."

"That's because I've discovered what actually matters to me here. I don't care what the suits in Washington think about me, I don't feel the burning urge to vindicate my father anymore, and now I've been reunited with the most important people... and the most important person in my life."

"Who?"

"Abby of course." Jenny laughed as Gibbs' expectant smile fell slightly.

"You're mean Jennifer Shepard."

"Oh, full name territory, that's not good."

"You're damn right Jen, not nice."

"Oh fine. Leroy Jethro Gibbs I missed you most of all."

The grin was back in full force on Gibbs' face.

"What did you miss?" he asked, genuinely curious.

"I missed sharing your coffee. I missed the smell of sawdust that accompanied any visit from you. I

missed these knowing smirks of yours. Do I need to go on?"

"No, cause it's my turn. I missed your hair and how it always smelled of your shampoo, something with jasmine I think. I missed the way you wore tights skirts to tease everyone. I miss the way you'd sneak up on my team using techniques I taught you and they still couldn't work out. I miss the way we'd have dinner together and I'd just want to kiss you there and then."

"Why didn't you?"

"Because you told me categorically on your first day that there would be no 'off the job'? I was trying to behave myself and hope that you would eventually change your mind."

"I almost did. A week before the shooting, I was so close to throwing the towel in and coming to you. I resolved that once I'd dealt with La Grenouille that I'd tell you I still felt the same way and that I still wanted to be with you and I hope you'd be receptive to me."

"I would have been more than receptive Jen. I don't think we'd have made it to the couch in your office if you would have told me that then."

Jen smiled ruefully.

"Seems I wasted years that we could've been together... twice. Well let me tell you, Leroy. Jethro. Gibbs. That I will not be walking away this time."

"I wasn't planning on letting you."

Jenny turned her body in Gibbs' arms and their lips met, their kiss a promise of at least trying to spend the rest of their lives together.


	10. Chapter 9

**I'm so sorry that this hasn't been updated in what feels like ages, Real Life unfortunately decided to come along and play havoc. But just as a guide, there'll probably be about 3 or 4 more chapters to this, although, with the way my writing gets away from me, who really knows. Thank you all for the reviews and follows, it really is a great incentive to write. x  
**

 ** _One Month Later_**

Gibbs headed into the house after a long day in the yard. Their current murder investigation had taken precedence over the trafficking ring for a temporary period but he was still trying his best to follow leads as he found them which led to a lot of long nights at his desk.

This night however he had decided to come home at a more decent hour and finally crossed the threshold to his house around 8pm.

Immediately, he was aware of the presence of someone else in the house. Looking around, he quickly identified a pair of stilettos and a jacket hanging up that he knew belonged to Jenny so he just began to head towards the basement. However, when he saw no light coming up the stairs, he paused, listening for any sounds in the house. In the silence, he quickly heard a sound that broke his heart.

Gibbs had only ever truly seen Jenny cry a few times.

Once had been one night in Paris where she mourned her father and had told him all about her relationship with her father and why she had pushed so hard to join NCIS in the end.

Another had been that first night in the hospital, although she didn't think he knew about that time. Since then however she had not shed a tear over the entire ordeal she went through, and Gibbs knew that it wasn't healthy for her. But, instead of confronting her, Gibbs had hoped she would either talk to Ducky, her usual confidant, or Ziva, or even open up eventually to him.

But it seemed the time for willing conversation had passed.

Entering the living room, Gibbs could see Jenny curled up on the couch, a blanket wrapped tightly around her. When she looked up as he entered the room, he could clearly see the tear tracks on her cheeks, and he knew that she had not only been there for quite some time, but she had also been crying most of the time she had been here.

"Hey, didn't know you would be here." Gibbs started softly, not wanting her to throw her defensive walls back up.

"I... I just needed to see you."

"Why?"

"Am I not allowed to want to spend time with you?"

"Jen, you are always more than welcome, however, for the past three weeks since you got out of hospital, you have avoided what happened to you like it's a plague. You haven't talked to anyone about it, despite Ziva knowing almost exactly what you've gone through and Ducky being your closest confidante. Both of them would keep your secrets and give you an outlet."

"I... I can't talk to them."

"Why not?"

"I... I know they mean well... but I couldn't cope... with the pity."

The sobbing breaths that Jenny took told Gibbs how close she was to once again breaking down and he decided that he would be there for her as she fell that night.

"Jen..." he started softly, "you want to talk about it? I mean, seriously? Because I'm here for you. I always will be, even if you don't want me."

"I'll... always want you... Jethro."

Gibbs sat on the couch at Jenny's feet and she quickly moved to lie with her head in his lap, allowing him to stroke her hair as he tried to help her consider her emotions and where to start.

"I... I was so scared."

Jenny's whisper almost took Gibbs by surprise but he listened to what she spoke, not saying anything.

"They took me from my home, my safe house home, and they tortured me. They fucked me and they beat me and they... they made me do... things I never thought would happen to me in a million years. I felt... I feel dirty, I feel used, I feel paranoid, I feel like I'm worthless, like a speck of dust could hold more worth than I do at this moment. And you know what, normally... normally I'd hide behind my walls. But they're gone now as well. Because of you. Because you taught me... you..."

Jenny couldn't stop the gasping breaths this time and once again dissolved into tearful sobs, turning to clutch onto Gibbs' shirt.

Gibbs manoeuvred his crying redhead into a more comfortable position as he supported her body against his own, allowing her to cry and let her release all of the tension that had built for far too long.

It was only after ten minutes that Jenny's crying seemed to tail off and her grip of Gibbs' shirt slackened, but he realised quickly that this had only happened because she had fallen asleep crying in his arms.

Tightening his arms around the sleeping woman, Gibbs stood and slowly climbed the stairs to his bedroom, placing her on his bed as she still slept. It was only then that Gibbs realised that she was already in a pair of yoga pants and a loose vest and he thankfully didn't have to undress her so he then quickly changed himself in the bathroom before sliding under the covers beside her. Gibbs carefully wrapped his arms around her waist, holding her close into his body and letting sleep take over.

* * *

Gibbs awoke groggily to see the room was still pitch dark. Confused for a moment, he finally felt something wriggling in his arms and moments later remembered bringing Jenny up to bed the night before. Carefully rolling back from her, Gibbs let his arms slide from around Jenny's waist up to her shoulders as he carefully shook her.

"Jen, stop moving, I can't sleep."

"Go back to your own house then and sleep there," was the mumbled response he received and he grinned as he realised she was barely awake.

"But there's no fun there Jen, You're not there, you're here."

"If by fun you mean irritating the living daylights out of me then no there's none of that there. But there is plenty of rest for me if that were to occur."

"Except one thing Jenny..."

Jenny finally rolled over to look at Gibbs.

"What?"

"We're in my house already. You fell asleep here."

Jenny sat up and looked around in the darkness, quickly realising they were indeed not in her bedroom.

"I fell asleep... in your bed?"

"Not quite."

"Jethro..."

"You kinda... cried yourself to a point of exhaustion so I brought you up here..."

Gibbs felt Jenny tense up beside him as he mentioned her moment of weakness the night before.

"I'm sorry about that Jethro, it wasn't my proudest moment."

"Oh no Jen, you're not doing this, you're not crawling back behind those walls of yours again. I only just got to see the damage that had been inflicted and now you're going to hide it again."

"You enjoy seeing my pain do you?" asked Jenny hotly.

"Not at all but it seems that seeing you at your most vulnerable is going to be the only way that I'm going to get you to open up about how much you've been hurt by all of this and then to try and help you heal from it."

"Jethro, I'm coping and 'healing' fine."

"Tonight says otherwise. Please, Jen, just talk to me."

"What more is there to say?"

Jen seemed to have finally remembered their discussion the night before and was ready to avoid the topic as much as she could.

"I want to know how you felt. I want to know every piece of hurt you felt. I want you to share it with me so you're sharing all of your pain with me. Then we can both move forwards together and I won't be left wondering what happened to you."

"You know, you saw the video."

"No I didn't. Jen, I refused to watch the video because I wanted to give you the chance to tell me what happened to you yourself. All I saw was the first video and then when I was with you. The rest has been left entirely to my imagination. And maybe watching the video might have left me without the doubts, but I want to give you the chance to tell me everything, including how it felt to you at the time. I want to be there for you Jen, in everything."

Jenny was touched by the emotion she could hear behind Gibbs' convictions. Before she could stop them, the tears spilled over down her cheeks and a drop landed on Gibbs' hand.

"Jen, I didn't mean to upset you, honestly."

"No Jethro, it's not that. I've never had someone care so much about me that they'd put themselves through such pain as you do. And you've done it for me time and again. What did I do to deserve you?"

"I ask the same every day Jen. How did I get such a resilient, beautiful, stubborn-" Jenny laughed at that- "wise and intelligent woman to agree to spend any time with me more than necessary with our jobs?"

"We make a pair, don't we Jethro?" asked Jenny, leaning forward and letting Gibbs wrap his arms around her.

"We certainly do."

The pair sat in silence for a few moments before Jenny began to speak once again.

This time, she told Jethro everything that she had told Fornell in her statement weeks ago but she added every feeling, breakdown and injury that she had felt whilst she had been held captive. There were several times that she had to stop talking and try and catch her breath, sobbing breaths showing how tightly she was holding on to the last vestiges of her calm visage.

When she finally finished, Gibbs understood completely why she had tried to hide how she was suffering. She was terrified that everyone would view her differently; that they would treat her as a victim and no longer as their friend. Although Gibbs knew the fear was unfounded, he understood her point of view completely as he had felt the same after his memory loss.

"Jen, I'm sure I don't need to tell you this, but the team would never do that. And besides, what's wrong with admitting you're a victim? There are plenty of women out there who have been victims and yet go on and survive what happened and become something brilliant. Just like I'm sure you will."

"But they're not me. They're not the former head of NCIS. They're not the daughter of Jasper Shephard. They're not… me."

"What about Probie Jenny, who was terrified as we started our first undercover operation? Or Jenny who I fell in love with? Or the Jen who managed to escape from some pretty hairy situations before. Just because you got hurt this time, and in such a vile way, doesn't mean that you can't come back from those like you have from the others. Maybe you're not Director Shephard anymore, maybe you've finally stepped out from beneath your father's shadow. Maybe you're finally able to be the Jenny Shepard you have the ability to be, to become better than you even were before."

"Do you really think so?" The hopeful look in her eyes would've hurt if Gibbs wasn't sure of his answer.

"I really do. Jen, you may not be your old self with the Director's walls and power suits but that doesn't mean you're not strong. You managed to survive going into the Witness Protection system and being kidnapped and tortured for god's sake. I don't know many people who could do that. So yeah, Jennifer Shephard, I really do think that you are going to come out the other side of this as a survivor."

Jen smiled softly, placing a soft kiss on Jethro's lips before she cuddled back into his side, allowing his steady breathing to lull her back to sleep as he watched over her.


	11. Chapter 10

**So I can only apologise that I haven't updated this in what feels like forever. Thank you very much for all the reviews/follows/favourites however as this and my friend's encouragement has given me a great incentive to get this finished. Hope you enjoy. x  
**

A Week Later

"Jethro, are you home?" Jenny asked as she began to descended the stairs into his basement.

A grunt was her only answer as she found Gibbs underneath his boat, both hands busy sanding the inside of this latest project.

"You know, it'd be nice to spend a night here that doesn't result in me ending up covered in woodchips."

"You don't have to come down here."

"Jethro, you don't even have a television set upstairs."

"Neither I do."

"Jethro..."

With a sigh Gibbs finally came out from under the boat, placing the sanding blocks on the ground beside him.

"Jen, what else are you wanting to do? I've made several suggestions-"

"All of which are on the doctor's no-go list for another fortnight. You know as well as I do Jethro that we'd both rather be in bed right now but that's just not going to happen right now."

The slightly insecure tone in Jenny's voice reminded Gibbs of what had happened and he immediately felt like an ass.

"I'm sorry Jen, I don't mean to be pushy..."

"I know you don't Jethro," Jenny moved towards her boyfriend, a label that felt bizarre for both, and sat on the ground in front of him, "and I would much prefer to spend our time like that as well but we'll be able to do all of that soon enough I'm sure. Then you'll be wanting time away from me."

"Never." The sincerity almost made Jen want to cry.

"Thank you Jethro. That means a lot." Gibbs reached forward and softly lifted Jen's chin, seeing tears about to fall from her lids.

"Let it go Jen." Jen shook her head, smiling softly.

Gibbs was worried about Jenny. Gibbs knew that the façade was back in place but he still couldn't tell how much damage had been done by her time held captive. They spent almost all the time he wasn't in work together, the only time she wasn't at his home was when she went back to the Georgetown townhouse to sleep. Gibbs had repeatedly offered a bed in his house but, other than that one night, Jenny continued to reject the option, muttering something about being unable to resist temptation. He didn't know if that was aimed at him or her.

When Gibbs did not respond, Jenny merely shook her head in amusement before moving over to his decanter and pouring some bourbon into an empty mason jar. Seeing that Gibbs already had a glass on the side, Jenny moved to sit on the new beanbag she had acquired for Gibbs' basement when she needed somewhere comfortable to relax.

* * *

When Gibbs finally put his sanding blocks down a few hours later, he felt his heart flutter a little as he saw Jenny had fallen asleep on her oversized beanbag, the glass of bourbon in front of her empty as the light from the television flickered over her features. Instead of waking her, Gibbs refilled his glass before sitting on his stool, his gaze switching between the TV set and his sleeping charge. He was glad to see that she had finally relaxed, her body lying limp in the cushion. As much as she was loathe to show her emotions outwardly, her body had told Gibbs all he needed to know. She was constantly held tense, as though anticipating an attack, her skin was pale, showing she had seen little sunlight in the past few weeks and the skin under her eyes was slightly purple, showing her lack of sleep. Gibbs had tried everything he could to get her to relax but the only time he had seen her looking anything like her old self was when she was in the training room at NCIS headquarters with Ziva. The women had begun to once again train together, and Ziva was more than happy to help her friend, knowing from personal experience that Jenny felt an urge to make sure her personal defences were the best she could possibly be at that point. The pair trained together until both were lying on the mats breathless four days a week when Ziva was not busy with casework, something which Gibbs was trying to ensure, knowing how much the sessions were helping Jenny.

Their fights had also garnered quite a notoriety in the gym, and they often had an audience as they trained together. Many of the agents at NCIS were ecstatic to discover that their former Director was in fact still alive and kicking, quite literally. More often than not there were always several agents around to witness the bouts between the two women. Indeed, that week Ziva had posited the idea that Jenny should try and adapt her training to fight against others within the agency that she trusted, and the previous day Jenny had fought against two of the younger agents from the JAG department, a male and a female, and had most definitely won.

Gibbs was disturbed from his musings however by movement from Jenny. her face had suddenly contorted into a frown and she seemed to be finding it difficult to breathe. As Gibbs stood and placed his glad on the worktable, she began to thrash around and the cries that began to fall from her lips broke Gibbs' heart.

"No! Please! JETHRO!"

Gibbs hurried to Jenny's side, finally resolving to wake her up.

"Jen, come on, it's just a nightmare, you're safe. Wake up."

But Jen didn't respond, instead seemingly to fall further into the hellish dream that she was surrounded by and she fought against invisible attackers.

Knowing the only way to wake Jen, Gibbs' grimaced before drawing his hand back and smacking Jenny around the back of the head. Jenny's eyes shot open and she sat upright, her hand moving to cradle the back of her head and tears suddenly bursting from her eyes as she tried to get her breathing under control.

"Jen, it's OK, you're OK now." Gibbs' soft voice finally caught Jenny's attention and she turned to look at him, her breath coming in soft sobs.

"J...Jethro. I'm sorry."

"Why? Jen, you have nothing to be sorry for."

"I'm supposed to be OK, I'm supposed to be strong, I'm not supposed to cry."

"That's bullshit Jen and you know it. You're allowed to be upset; you were raped for fuck's sake."

"But I'm here. I'm not permanently injured, I'm not still out there. I have my friends and family; I should be grateful."

"Grateful for these things yes. But that doesn't stop you from being hurt. That doesn't stop you from being a vict-"

"Don't. I'm not a victim."

"Not this again. Jen, you are."

"I'M NOT! I will not be branded a victim!"

"Why not Jen? What's so wrong with it? How is it different from being a victim of robbery or assault?"

"IT JUST IS!"

Gibbs realised that the pairs' voices had begun to rise in argument, and they were almost shouting at each other.

Trying to calm the volatile situation down, Gibbs shuffled closer to Jenny, trying to pull her into his lap but she refused to budge, the tears still streaming down her cheeks.

"How often are you having these nightmares?" he asked, blunt and to the point, knowing it was the only way to get Jenny to respond.

"This is the first."

"Liar."

Jethro knew all of Jenny's tells and she had set off every single one with her answer. It upset Gibbs that she wasn't willing to let him help her.

"I'm not lying."

"Jen, there's no way in hell that you have not had a nightmare before now. Is that why you refuse to stay over? Because you've been waking at night."

Suddenly all of Jenny's actions began to make sense to Gibbs. He realised then that she was hiding her suffering from him and everyone else.

"Jethro, nothing is happening. I was sleeping in a different place and it must've set me off."

"Jen, why won't you let me help?" pleaded Gibbs.

"I don't need help! I don't have any problems! I just want to get on with my life and forget this bullshit ever happened! I WANT TO BE ABLE TO LIVE MY LIFE WITHOUT NIGHTMARES AND WATCHING MY BACK CONSTANTLY AND BEING SCARED SHITLESS EVERY TIME SOMEONE OPENS A GODDAMNED DOOR!"

Gibbs listened as Jenny began to scream, hurting that she hadn't shared any of this with him before but glad that she was finally able to just let it all go and let out the pent-up emotion that had been bubbling beneath the surface for weeks.

"I'm fine Jethro I promise you."

"Jen, I've never seen you look this tense before, not even when you were Director. This isn't good for you. You need to relax."

"Says the one who has the record for overtime in NCIS."

"I'm driven in certain cases yes but this isn't being driven. This is being pig-headed and not getting help when you clearly need it!"

"I don't need help, I'm fine!"

"Anyone who's dealt with you in the past month would say otherwise. You've been irritable, tired, nervous, twitchy, judgemental. We all know why but it would make people understand you better if you weren't to present this bloody martyr facade all the time!"

"Oh so I'm a martyr now? Nice to know what you think of me! That I clearly need a cause to crucify myself for or I have no point in living."

"With the way you're being all defensive right now, I'd say yeah. You're certainly not trying to heal from this and move on. You seem to want to stay stuck in this cycle of nightmares and limited communication, with the occasional burst of violence."

A hand cracked across Gibbs' face as Jenny finally lost her temper at him.

"You know what, fuck you Leroy Jethro Gibbs. I thought you were the man for me. I thought you wanted us to be together as much as I did but I can see that you just miss your old sparring partner and bed warmer. Well guess what, I'm not her anymore, and I doubt I ever will be again. I have baggage, and plenty of it, and if you're not willing to deal with it, then I'm not willing to deal with you."

Jenny stood up and hastily grabbed her shoes and handbag which lay on the floor beside her, before turning and marching up the staircase. Gibbs simply let her walk out of the basement and listened as the front door slammed, only then letting out a defeated sigh. He knew he'd pushed her too far and they'd taken a step backwards. He could only hope that by letting her calm down a little and going to see her in a couple of days he was doing the right thing.

He didn't know however that Jenny was still sat in her car outside, the tears pouring down hr face as she tried to work out how to fix the mess that was her life and, more importantly, herself. She was distraught that Gibbs had just let her walk out of the house and leave, she was angry with him for bringing up such memories, she was frustrated with herself that she couldn't shake her nightmares, and she was terrified that she was going to lose everything, again. Finally starting the engine, Jenny drove home, feeling for the entire ride like she'd left a little bit of herself behind, but too proud to go back. When she finally let herself into her old family Brownstone, she hid herself away in her study, pouring herself a generous measure of bourbon, unaware that the cause of her heartache was doing the exact same thing exactly where she'd left him.


End file.
